


Swing Low, Sweet Chariot

by Lasertits



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Canon Darkness, Fix-It, Gen, Mirror Universe, Rescue, Slavery, canon angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-12
Updated: 2018-02-12
Packaged: 2019-03-17 10:19:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13656978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lasertits/pseuds/Lasertits
Summary: Michael rights a wrong.





	Swing Low, Sweet Chariot

 

She was educated on Vulcan, yes, but she has studied human history.

 

She knows what the color of her skin once meant. She has seen the holos of the great plantations.

She is the distant grandchild of the ones that lived their whole lives without hope, but also of the ones that fled, and roused support, and who returned to set their brothers and their sisters free.

They are all in her, and they are furious at what they’re seeing now.

 

—-

No Kelpian in this place ever flares their ganglia. It is no use, when death is always near. She wonders what it would be like to live her life like that.

 

—-

The hands washing her are calloused but gentle. There are whorls and ridges swirling up the forearms, inviting touch, and it strikes her that this, exactly, is how Saru’s skin looks.

It would be uncomfortably intimate, especially considering her own nudity. But the gulf of power between them eradicates any trace of impropriety, if only to be replaced by a deeper shame.

 

A Terran Captain naked before her slave is no different than a Terran Captain naked before any other of her objects. The hands, now on her shoulders, are hers, as is the rest of the body they’re attached to.

She should leave it be. Whatever happens, it is vital that she does not blow her cover. She has already done and witnessed things that have rotted her soul in its casing, and still she must prevail. One more won’t matter.

But she is full of ghosts, and they will not rest.

 

—-

He notices her looking. Of course he does.

”I am..fully trained”, he says, with an elegant gesture to himself. His eyes are downcast and his frame betrays no tension.

 

”No!”

”No”, she repeats, softer, when he flinches. He merely nods and takes a step back, waiting patiently for her next order.

”That will be all”, she says, and, ”Goodnight, Saru”, before she can stop herself.

 

He glances up at her, quick confused flick of blue out of the corner of his eye, like a lamb eyeing a lion who for some reason waits to pounce, and then he leaves.

 

  
—-

They will not rest, and so neither can she. There is a wrong right here, right beside you, they say. Daughter, you must amend this.

So she speaks.

 

”Can I trust your discretion?”

”No Kelpian can betray their master.”  
He’s fastening her belt, and his soft voice is directly by her ear.

There are so many things she wants to ask him, but she can’t. She straightens, smooths her disgraceful uniform.

 

”I’m going to need you to trust me.

I’m going to take you to the transporter room. There is a man, on the other side. It’s difficult to explain, but he is you, in a way. He will help you.

Tell him..tell him I’m sorry. About the others. I’m sorry he has to know. Tell him I’m coming soon.

Don’t be afraid.”

 

He merely nods, as always. She can tell that he doesn’t believe her. He probably thinks it is a cruel game.

 

——-

”A Kelpian, Captain? Why not just send it to the kitchens if you’re tired of it?”

 

The transporter room is unchanged from when she saw it last, when it was used as an instrument of murder. An unfamiliar technician stands at the controls, looking every bit like someone on their third night shift.

 

”Do you presume to tell me what to do with my possessions? Stand back!” she barks.

The icy rage she feels must lend her credibility, because the man grows deathly pale and slinks off to the wall. She takes his place and snaps her fingers at ”Saru”.

 

He walks up to the platform calmly, stands there with his hands clasped lightly in front of him in the usual attitude of servility.

She enters the coordinates as quickly as she can, and raises the relays.

 

Just before the end, he gives a sharp gasp and his threat ganglia flare. He makes a quick, furtive gesture to smooth them down that is so her Saru that her heart aches. Then he dissolves into light.

”It’s not death”, she wants to tell him, but he is already gone.

 

She stands there for a moment, staring at the empty platform, until the technician behind her shifts nervously so his boots scrape on the floor. She glares at him with an expression that says ”Would you like a turn, too?” and the frightened man bows and excuses himself.

  
The walk back to her quarters is long and silent. Why then, she wonders, does she imagine she hears singing?

  
——

 


End file.
